‘A fantastic read with brilliant characters… A perfect ending… did not see that coming. 5 stars’
‘one of the best books out the hundred I’ve read this year so far’
‘A great read from start to finish – highly recommended’
To grab your copy, head on over to Amazon – thanks always for your support!
It’s with great delight that I can share the news that A Wanted Man, my debut novel, has been published by Endeavour Press. You can grab it here!
A Wanted Man is, simply put, the story of a soldier who was discarded, but still has more to give. I kept asking myself what it would feel like to give everything for your country, only to come back to find everything was different – including yourself. What would happen if you only have training for things that are of no use at all in regular civilian life? What do you do when you’ve grown up while fighting wars abroad, only for the fighting to end and you’re not needed anymore? When I posed these questions to myself, the character of Ben Bracken began to form in my answers.
When I was 17, I wrote a screenplay that was about a criminal gang in Manchester, UK, near where I still live today. It was profoundly formulaic, and followed similar tropes seen in countless movies over the years. I loved a good crime yarn, and wanted to write one – that was my simple motivation. But as I got older, I mulled over this screenplay time and time again, realising that something was missing. It was only when my own friends and acquaintances started to come back from Afghanistan, and I spoke with them about their experiences, did the penny drop. Their collective states, each varied, inspired me hugely, both in terms of my admiration for them, and creatively as well.
And then I thought about dropping an ex-soldier into that old crime screenplay I’d written. The possibilities suddenly seemed endless, and I was away. The creative process organically seemed to turn the project into a novel, as I started from fresh. Before long I was flying and in 8 weeks, I’d written the first draft.
That was late 2013, and since then I have grown immeasurably, both personally and in terms of my writing, and it’s with immense pride that A Wanted Man finds readers today. I really hope you enjoy it. I had a blast writing it, and there’s plenty more to come from Ben Bracken, mark my words.
Read this great novel, My Sister’s Grave by Robert Dugoni, and really enjoyed it. I grabbed it after seeing an advert for Dugoni’s latest, and wanted to go back to the start of the series – yep, I’m one of those. Can’t just dive in at any point, have to go right back to the start and see things through as the author intended. So, this is the first book in Dugoni’s Tracy Crosswhite series, and it will certainly not be the last Crosswhite adventure I read – principally because of the grand ethical question posed to the reader as the book reaches its exciting climax.
Without further ado… SPOILERS. Big ones. Don’t read on, if you don’t want to know!
Crosswhite is a Seattle police detective whose sister was kidnapped and murdered 20 years ago, and the whole case comes back to the surface when her sister’s body is finally found and things don’t quite add up. There is a man in jail for the murder, Edmund House, serving life, thanks to a guilty verdict based on circumstantial evidence and a rather inconsistent legal case. Crosswhite doesn’t think he did it, thinks he was framed as part of a wider conspiracy, and enlists the help of an old friend, now criminal defence lawyer, to start in motion the wheels for a retrial. As the story progresses, the original conviction is unravelled, and it becomes obvious that a conspiracy was the reason House ended up behind bars, the local law enforcement and the victim’s father joining forces to put House away for good.
We as readers are so set up throughout to question exactly the motives of the conspirators, and get us questioning who may really have killed her and why. The motion for a retrial is so successful that House is immediately freed, the Judge appalled at the miscarriage of justice.
Then things start to go wrong. The original conspirators are attacked, and Crosswhite is kidnapped. Edmund House is revealed to have been behind it all along, and Crosswhite has inadvertently fought for the freedom of her sister’s killer.
And here’s the question, and where the tables are turned.
The conspirators reveal that they did frame House for the murder. House confessed to the crimes off the record, but it couldn’t be used in trial because of issues with admissibility. So to make sure that it couldn’t happen to anyone else, that the town could move on again after such a heinous crime had been perpetrated in its midst, the authorities made sure House was convicted.
By the time House was on the run again at the end of the book, and the truth had all come out, my own feelings towards the conspirators had gone 180 degrees, and now a couple of days after finishing it, they might have moved again to rest somewhere in the middle. Truth is, I haven’t a clue where I stand.
Do you go by the book, knowing you did the right thing but also knowing that you can’t stop further bad things from happening?
Or do you break the rules, live with the risks, and know that you ignored the traditional boundaries of right and wrong to make sure that overall good is the result?
I haven’t a clue.
I can’t possibly say that the police did the right thing… but I can’t also say for sure they did the wrong thing.
And that’s what I love about books like this in particular – books that challenge the reader, and make them confront difficult feelings of their own, make us make difficult choices and make us think about what would be deemed as ‘right’ in the most tragic and disastrous of circumstances. What is the cost of justice? What is the cost of doing the right thing?
It certainly made for a compelling read, and left me asking myself questions long into the night – and in that sense I could only recommend the book very highly. Haven’t a clue where Crosswhite goes from here, but itching to find out.
I’ve waxed lyrical on here before about my love of Ace Atkins’ Quinn Colson books, and am working my way steadily through the stories. Each one seems better than the last, which is quite some feat, but there is no doubt this is crime writing of the highest order, with a cast of characters that I now find utterly indispensable. However, while reading The Broken Places, the third in the Quinn Colson series, Atkins managed to do something rare, unexpected and, I would imagine, damn difficult – and that is to create a villain who is so awful yet so pitiable, that you can’t help feeling sorry for him.
There be spoilers ahead, so fair warning….
The book opens with two convicts (Esau and Bones) escaping prison, and heading off for Jericho – the town where our hero, Quinn Colson, is the sheriff. They’ve got business with Dixon, a convict turned preacher, who just so happens to be seeing Quinn’s sister Caddy. In basic terms, Esau and Bones pulled off a bank heist, and told Dixon where the money is hidden while inside. They head off to get their money, but believe Dixon has screwed them and taken the money for himself. So far, so very good indeed.
Esau is a foul, fascinating creation: a stinking, nihilistic hulk who shoots people in cold blood for next to no reason. He’s a user, a man of extreme violence, a thief and a bully… BUT… his character is multi-layered in the darkest of ways. I can’t recall him doing a single ‘nice‘/redemptive thing in the entire book, but I still couldn’t help feeling sorry for him in a way at the end.
He has principles, that in his warped mind he thinks are enough to live by. He’ll kidnap a woman and child, hold them at gunpoint, but apologise for it. He still does the foul deed, but he doesn’t necessarily have to feel good about it.
He repeatedly accuses his ‘woman’ Becky of cheating on him and trying to screw him out of the money too, but soon apologises and shows genuine affection for her.
He looked after Dixon in jail, because he was being worked to death in the fields at the penitentiary, and Dixon got him a job in the cafeteria, thereby saving him. He worked with Dixon in prison while he started to preach, and began to feel close to God himself – all the while planning to bust out to get his money back.
He beats Dixon to a pulp when he thinks he’s holding out on him, even shoots him in the leg, but stops short of killing him, aware of how much Dixon helped him in jail.
He is a myriad of the nastiest contradictions, a man who exists solely on his own jet black terms. He navigates life according to a moral compass that only has the tiniest sliver of morality to it. As a villainous creation he is one of my utter favourites, in that he was wildly unpredictable, yet somehow relatable, on the most base levels possible.
This is no mean feat, and my favourite part about the book. A villain like this, who has conflict, is so much more interesting than a one dimensional ‘baddie‘, and it’s the little things like this that elevate books and crime writers to other levels entirely – not to mention inspiring other writers to try to bring something new to the table, and to challenge themselves and their readers. It has certainly done that to me.
One of the problems of days only having 24 hours in them is that it doesn’t possibly give you enough time to get everything done. I’m not talking about the mundane day to day stuff, but more like, well… I thought I’d have mastered at least fifteen languages by now, and be a 7th dan black belt in something obscure and dangerous. And it means that oftentimes things slip the net.
Getting stuck into the works of Ian Rankin is one of them, I’m ashamed to say. A name that is essentially a byword for peak British crime writing, and I haven’t managed to get there yet… but thankfully I’ve managed to put it right.
I’m so glad I did. Rankin’s words have been dissected by hundreds of much worthier voices (and much more on-the-ball voices) but I can easily see Rankin’s work nestling in alongside my all time favourites and biggest influences. There is a bravery, a poeticism, an economical forthright darkness that had me enthralled. One of my favourite descriptions of Adrian McKinty’s work is ‘this is hard boiled crime fiction with a poet’s touch‘ (Peter Blauner), and that felt resonant here too – and it was reading Rankin’s praise of McKinty that reminded me I had to get onto Knots and Crosses, the first of Rankin’s iconic Rebus series.
In doing so I have found another mesmerising literary voice whose work I can’t wait to press right through. I have ordered the next ten Rebus books as a start. It’s not often I’ll be so impetuous but on this occasion I’ve no doubt it’s the right move.
Wait, is that the doorbell? Please be the postman with a sizeable book-shaped parcel…
Grabbed this one, John Grisham’s Rogue Lawyer, while I was at Copenhagen airport, and dug straight into it on the flight home.
Grisham’s writing is, as always, dependable and engaging, and the story of a lawyer who will represent literally anyone, and the scrapes that might cause, is one that I enjoyed. It read much more like a compendium than a stand alone novel – I’m not sure that’s a gripe, more of an observation. There were strands weaving through four fairly distinct stories, so it was like reading four shorts.
The courtroom settings and procedural thrills are Grisham at his purest, while a few critics have noted that this is Grisham on autopilot. However, if you enjoy your Grisham novels (and I have been known to myself) then you’ll find this a breezy, engaging yarn.
When Deep Down Dead was first published as an ebook in October, I managed to convince myself to wait for the paperback in early January. I was very excited to read it, and had been for years – so I thought a couple more months couldn’t hurt.
Then the reviews started coming in – five stars upon five stars, with some of the biggest names in crime writing on both sides of the Atlantic weighing in with heavy praise and before I knew it, I was bursting to read it even more. The paperback couldn’t arrive quickly enough.
The reason I was so excited is because I was actually present when the book was pitched as part of the Pitch Perfect contest at Bloody Scotland 2014 (a hell an event, by the way). I sat there (having just signed with my own literary agent, tentatively dipping my little toe into the literary waters) and listened in awe as Steph Broadribb span a fascinating yarn about a female bounty hunter in Florida, drawing from her own experiences training as a bounty hunter in California – I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was a book I wanted to read immediately.
Prior to that event, and for a good year after, I never once made the link that Steph was in fact Crime Thriller Girl, the popular crime blogger whose reviews, articles and recommendations I had always followed and enjoyed. It was only when word started to get out about ‘the book with the female bounty hunter in Florida’ that the penny began to drop. I was thrilled and delighted to hear that I was actually going to get to read that exciting story, that Steph was going to be published, and that that same story that got me hooked in that pitching contest was going to be her debut.
Regarding the book itself, there are far more eminent crime writers out there whose words carry far more weight than my own – but I just love what Steph has done, how she has delivered it, and what a great series (I hope!) she has set up. I’m fully invested in Lori Anderson, JT and Dakota, and am so excited to see what happens next. If you like your thrillers fast, urgent and gripping, with a great, fresh, relatable protagonist, in a setting that drips with intrigue and genuine authenticity, then Deep Down Dead will be right up your street.
As I’m learning, in crime publishing you tend to find just the nicest people – and Steph is no exception. She has been so kind, generous and encouraging towards myself, in ways that I never expected or assumed. Make no mistake, Crime Thriller Girl is one of the good guys… and to see this book go from beginning to such a spectacularly successful end is so very pleasing.
It has been pointed out to me more than a few times that I can be a bit OTT when it comes to explaining things I liked or enjoyed. A particularly good episode of The Apprentice can quickly become ‘the best thing I’ve ever watched’, and a fresh piece of melon is sometimes ‘the greatest thing I’ve ever tasted’. It means that when I describe something I tend to throw in the big guns so quickly that they lose all meaning – and it’s something I think a lot of people are guilty of, to some extent. I’m all for being positive, but here I’m going to try not to rely on my old tropes. Words like unbelievable and incredible are banned here (for this post at least). Here goes…
Discovering a new author is a joy, and it always has been. Discovering a new author whose work thrills you and seems to connect with you time and time again is a step further than that. When writing too, finding that someone who inspires, informs and delights is also a watershed moment. That’s how I feel at the moment with Dennis Lehane.
Yes, I’m years too late. Quite literally decades too late. I know his books have already been dissected and pawed over by millions of readers already, but that means nothing to me, aside from confirming to me that I’m in the right place, and that I’m not the only one who feels this way.
I’ve read a handful of Lehane’s books now, and have been more and more taken with each novel – and the last one I read, Darkness, Take My Hand, has immediately become one of my favourite books of all time. And no, I’m not resorting to my old outlandish descriptions for things that perhaps don’t deserve it. I genuinely see it as a cornerstone book in my own development as both a reader and a writer.
It is the second book in the Kenzie & Gennaro series, about two private investigators in Boston and their adventures. On this occasion, the past has come back to bite Patrick Kenzie in the form of a serial killer, who gruesomely terrorises Patrick’s old neighbourhood as part of a grander historical plan.
It was published in 1996, but it reads like the top crime fiction bestseller of 2017. Or 2018. Or 2019… Point is, there’s a freshness, a timelessness, a pointed transient quality that lifts the book out of a place in time and puts it in the here and now of whenever the here and now happens to be. I’ll read it again in a few years and still be taken by it.
Something I’m trying to learn about putting into my own work is layers, and I think I try to hard at it to get it right. Lehane’s work is full of layers, and it all feels so effortless yet so keenly worked. Social commentary, existentialism, politics, life, love, the hereafter… It’s all here, and the work feels so enriched and multi-faceted because of it. The result is challenging and rewarding for the reader. Something I constantly despise is the snobbery in the literary world towards crime books and their merits in being able to tackle bigger things. I assure you, my thoughts were more provoked, teased, prodded and bullied during this novel than with anything of a supposedly more literary nature – the only difference being that Lehane doesn’t seem so keen to point out how clever and high-brow he is being. Lesson for me to take on board here – you don’t need to sound like a patronising windbag in order to tackle themes you might think you shouldn’t.
And on this topic, Lehane doesn’t shoehorn it in. He doesn’t bring up the socio-economic differences between race and class because he’s making a grander point off the page – it is here because it benefits the story and the world our characters exist in. It makes it more nuanced, more varied, more real. Layers.
On the topic of his world, it is a meticulously detailed landscape which is just as much a character as any human voice in the novel. The streets, the neighbourhood, the atmosphere, are all very much a part of the story. I’ve never been there, but I feel like I’ve never left. It’s a testament to Lehane’s powers of both observation and descriptive talent that I feel as embedded in the Dorchester neighbourhood of Boston as the characters. And again, you’re never bludgeoned with it. It’s just… there. And it’s just… happening.
The characters are typically varied, rounded and masterfully drawn, and again it is that testament of getting the reader to know and understand that characters without bashing you ever the head with it. Histories are shared and explained without you noticing. Personalities are shown but never told. The reader falls into it all and becomes part of the cast of characters, a Houdini-like sleight of hand trick that has happened before you know it has. Kenzie & Gennaro are unlike any characters I’ve come across. They are bold, brave, sensitive and damaged, but in ways that don’t rely on old conventions or lame pointers. Layers again. Another trick author’s try so hard to pull is to make the audience care for the protagonist – Lehane manages this here again like David Copperfield with a pen. It’s done before I know it. A little misdirection here, and hey presto, I’m following Kenzie & Gennaro until the bitter end.
Plot. It’s surprising and terrifying. I’ll give nothing away, but it’s an unravelling onion of the darkest corners human beings have, and what pushes people into them. Every time you think our characters have a handle on things, the rug isn’t so much pulled as detonated with a case of C4. It moves at such a speed that managing to evoke the care for character and environment as already mentioned is a miraculous achievement. I’d finished the book before I even got to grips with how much I was enjoying it, and I didn’t want it to end – but I hoped the end would bring safety to the characters and neighbourhood.
I’m going to call it a day there, but the third Kenzie & Gennaro book is sitting on my shelf behind me. I’ll be into it before the week is out I’m sure. But I’ve learned so much from reading this one, lessons I hope to take forward myself. With your writing, you can go for it, in every sense of the word. There’s no point otherwise. Don’t idle in neutral. Take it to the readers. Ignore convention and snobbery. Find that voice in you that won’t shut up, and make it impossible to ignore. If you do you might just write something that someone will call the best thing ever. Whoops. Couldn’t help it.
Hey folks! Got back late last night after an enthralling weekend Bloody Scotland International Crime Writing Festival, and am jiggered to the bone. Had such an interesting, fascinating and fun time, and will definitely be going back. In fact, if it was on again next weekend, I’d be checking hotel availability pronto – it was that good.
Why? A number of things, but the standout feature was the warmth of the event. It was downright friendly! First thing I did on arrival was check out the Festival Bookshop (another triumph, albeit one that is more guiltily-enjoyed and wallet-draining), but before going in, I popped my head around the corner of the room next door. I didn’t know it was the green room, but kind of worked it out pretty quickly when I saw actual authors in there. My legs jellied just like when I bumped into John Barnes in Toys’R’Us in Warrington, 1990. But every author I had the privilege of meeting was extremely friendly, down-to-earth, chatty, warm and seemed delighted to be there. This led to some fascinating conversations, and has sent me home as a new resident of cloud 9.
And as for the events themselves? Superb. I was lucky enough to attend the Deanston Scottish Crime Book of the Year Award dinner, and it was a special evening, with excellent food, great company and – yes, you guessed it – a very friendly atmosphere. Not to mention some cracking whiskey. A love for crime fiction was apparent in everyone I spoke to, and it provided a basis for good conversation. At the dinner I was extremely lucky to be seated near the lovely Alexandra Sokoloff, whose book The Harrowing is one that I had enjoyed very much a few years previously. She was so generous with her time, and spoke at length with myself (over a glass of Deanston, naturally). I’ll always be grateful for the kindness she showed me, and the advice she imparted.
I enjoyed immensely hearing the authors speak at the events about their own works and the stories behind their own journeys as novelists, and especially enjoyed hearing from Nele Neuhaus, Danielle Ramsay, Ragnar Jonasson, Quentin Bates and Yrsa Sigurdardottir. It felt a bit like a masterclass at times, with nuggets of information raining readily. After each session I was dizzy with adrenaline and left invigorated, and now have so much to think about and look back upon with interest.
A special mention must go to the city of Stirling and Scotland as a whole. It was a pleasure and an honour to be enshrined in one of Scotland’s iconic cities with some of the most dazzling domestic and international writers. I couldn’t recommend the festival highly enough, and thank everyone involved, from the authors, who were so generous with their time, to the organisers, whose evident commitment behind the scenes led to a throughly enjoyable time.
I will definitely be back – in fact, how are you fixed for next week?
